A tense final day of witness testimony brought an unusually lengthy preliminary hearing to a close for the co-founders of Epic Charter School.
Now, Oklahoma County Special Judge Jason Glidewell must determine whether the prosecution of David Chaney, 46, and Ben Harris, 50, can advance toward trial. He is expected to rule from the bench on April 16.
The hearing ended Friday after five days of witness testimony in March 2024, an almost two-year delay because of procedural disputes and three more days this week of questioning Epic’s former chief financial officer, Josh Brock, 43.
As the final day wore on, attorneys on both sides grew increasingly frustrated with each other, culminating in a lead prosecutor, Jimmy Harmon, calling defense attorney Joe White “the world’s largest leprechaun.” White was wearing a green suit and tie.
The judge chided both sides multiple times while acknowledging “passions are high.”
The decision now rests with Glidewell whether prosecutors have gathered enough evidence to establish probable cause.
Chaney, Harris and Brock were charged in 2022 with racketeering, embezzlement, conspiracy to defraud the state and other financial offenses. Prosecutors allege they engineered a complex scheme through Epic and a related for-profit company to enrich themselves with funds intended for public school students.
Chaney and Harris deny any wrongdoing. Their attorneys contended the co-founders carried out proper business practices that were transparently outlined in public contracts at advice of legal counsel.
“It wasn’t in some back bar with cigar smoke, trying to cheat the state of Oklahoma,” White, Harris’ attorney, said during the hearing Friday. “They were as transparent as glass.”
Brock was the sole witness to take the stand this week. He testified against Chaney and Harris as part of a plea agreement for no prison time.
He agreed with the Attorney General’s Office to plead guilty, cooperate with the prosecution and pay restitution in exchange for 15 years of probation as a convicted felon.
However, Brock said Friday he didn’t believe at the time he was working with Epic that he was embezzling funds. He said he realized much later, after consulting with his defense attorneys, that some of their practices were “problematic.”
Chaney’s attorney, Gary Wood, questioned why Brock would agree to plead guilty if he didn’t believe at the time that he was committing fraud.
“It wasn’t until your current legal counsel told you, or laid it out for you, that you said, ‘Well, yeah, maybe I did,’” Wood said to him during cross-examination.
Brock testified this week that he and Harris developed invoices with false itemized expenses to skirt state law and justify the millions of dollars Epic paid their business. That company, called Epic Youth Services, profited at least $55 million from a management fee for running the charter school, investigators reported.
The co-founders set up a second company, EdTech, to shield their profits from ever becoming public information, Brock said.
Epic Youth Services also had control of Epic’s Student Learning Fund, which set aside $800 to $1,000 for each student to spend on a curriculum, learning technology and extracurricular activities. The co-founders contend the money belonged to their private company and therefore could not be embezzled.
Whether that money is public or private, Harmon said Wednesday, is “not relevant” because the defendants “are not charged with embezzling public funds.” The company was entrusted with money that should have been spent to benefit students, he said.
The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation reported Chaney, Harris and Brock used Learning Fund money for personal expenses, political donations, other charter schools and to refill their company’s operating account. They used the public charter school’s tax identification number to make the purchases and never claimed the money on their income tax returns, the OSBI reported.
“When the EYS operating account got too low, where did they go? They went to the piggy bank that was the Student Learning Fund to infuse capital,” Harmon said. “To suggest that they did not profit from those infusions — we know of 52 transactions to infuse (and) inject capital from the Learning Fund to the EYS operating account — is preposterous.”
Oklahoma Voice is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Oklahoma Voice maintains editorial independence.
